52 Facts About Stephen Mallory

Stephen Russell Mallory was an American politician who was a United States Senator from Florida from 1851 to the secession of his home state and the outbreak of the American Civil War in 1861.

Stephen Mallory wrote a bill and guided it through Congress to provide for compulsory retirement of officers who did not meet the standards of the profession.

Stephen Mallory held the position throughout the existence of the Confederacy.

Stephen Mallory resigned after the Confederate government had fled from Richmond at the end of the war, and he and several of his colleagues in the cabinet were imprisoned and charged with treason.

Stephen Mallory returned to Florida, where he supported his family in his final years by again practicing law.

Stephen Mallory's health began to deteriorate although he was not incapacitated until the very end.

Stephen Mallory was the father of Stephen Russell Mallory II, a US Representative and US Senator from Florida.

Stephen Mallory was born in Trinidad, British West Indies, in 1812.

Stephen Mallory's father was a construction engineer originally from Redding, Connecticut.

Stephen Mallory met and married the Irish-born Ellen Russell in Trinidad, and there the couple had two sons.

Young Stephen Mallory was sent to school near Mobile, Alabama, but his education was interrupted by his father's death.

Young Stephen Mallory prepared for a profession by reading law in the office of Judge William Marvin.

Marvin was recognized as an authority on maritime law, particularly applied to laws of wreck and salvage, and Stephen Mallory argued many admiralty cases before him.

Stephen Mallory was reputed to be one of the best young trial lawyers in the state.

Stephen Mallory's career prospering, in 1838 Mallory courted and wed Angela Moreno, a member of a wealthy Spanish family living in Pensacola.

Stephen Mallory held a few minor public offices, beginning in 1832 with his selection as town marshal.

Stephen Mallory sought reappointment, but he had aligned himself too strongly with the Fire-eaters, and had antagonized some commercial interests in the state.

Stephen Mallory was more successful with bills aimed at prosecuting the ongoing campaign against the Seminole Indians, although the problem seems to have been overstated.

Stephen Mallory introduced bills that provided for marine hospitals in port cities in Florida.

Stephen Mallory was placed on the Senate Committee on Naval Affairs.

Stephen Mallory's assignment became significant when President Millard Fillmore, in his Message to Congress of December 13,1851, recommended Congressional action on two issues.

Stephen Mallory's position was unpopular throughout the nation, and Congress refused to lift the ban.

Stephen Mallory was by this time chairman of the Senate Committee on Naval Affairs, and the law that Congress passed was recognized as coming from his hand.

The enmity between Maury and Stephen Mallory lasted the remainder of their lives and distorted their performance in the Civil War when both men sided with the South.

Stephen Mallory kept abreast of developments in other navies, and he made sure that the US Navy would incorporate the latest thinking into its new ships.

Stephen Mallory was here somewhat ahead of his time, enthusiastically supporting iron cladding for ships before the fledgling metals industry in the country could supply it in the requisite quantities.

Stephen Mallory spoke up for extending appropriations for an armored vessel that was intended for the defense of New York Harbor; named the Stevens Battery after its designer and builder Robert L Stevens, it had been laid down in 1842 but was still incomplete in 1853, when Mallory gave his argument.

Stephen Mallory's pleading was unsuccessful in that the Senate did not agree to continue funding the project, but in his supporting speech he expressed some of the principles that guided his thinking when he later became the Confederate Secretary of the Navy.

Stephen Mallory advocated reconciliation almost up to the moment that Florida passed its ordinance of secession.

The constitution provided for a navy that would be directed by its own department, and President Jefferson Davis nominated Stephen Mallory to be Confederate States Secretary of the Navy.

Stephen Mallory was chosen for two principal reasons: first, he had extensive experience with nautical affairs, both in his boyhood home of Key West and later in Washington; and second, he was from Florida.

At the start, the Confederate Navy faced one of the problems that Stephen Mallory had encountered when he was chairman of the United States Senate Committee on Naval Affairs: an overabundance of high-ranking officers who were too old to go to sea.

Still not completely satisfied, in 1863 Stephen Mallory initiated the creation of a Provisional Navy, which in effect established two officer corps.

Stephen Mallory believed that by attacking the merchant shipping that carried trade to Northern ports he could force his Union counterpart, Secretary of the Navy Gideon Welles, to divert his own small fleet to defend against the raiders.

Issuance of the letters was not in the purview of the Navy Department, but Stephen Mallory was aware of them and saw them as part of his plan.

Stephen Mallory was more directly involved in the activities of the commissioned raiders, ships of the Confederate States Navy that were sent out to destroy rather than capture enemy commerce.

Stephen Mallory first proposed their use as early as April 18,1861.

Stephen Mallory argued that the Confederacy could never produce enough ships to compete with the industrial Union on a ship-by-ship basis.

Stephen Mallory sank two major Union warships, and menaced a third, which had grounded in the attempt to get into action.

Stephen Mallory selected two men as his primary representatives: James D Bulloch and Lieutenant James H North of the Confederate States Navy.

Stephen Mallory sought diligently and discreetly in England to acquire ships for the purposes of his government while working within or around the framework of the neutrality laws of the host nation.

Probably Stephen Mallory would have liked to have more, but the record shows that the few that were commissioned were more than adequate.

The Civil War provided a testing ground for numerous innovations in warfare, and Stephen Mallory was in position to provide support for many of them.

Also weighing in against Mallory was Senator Charles M Conrad, chairman of the Naval Affairs Committee, who was not a member of the investigating committee but who did appear as a prosecution witness.

Stephen Mallory was one of the Confederate leaders who were charged with treason, among other things; on May 20,1865, while he was still at La Grange, he was roused from his sleep at about midnight and taken into custody.

For several months, the demand of the public for vengeance increased, so that Stephen Mallory feared that he would face the death penalty if convicted.

From his prison cell, Stephen Mallory began to write letters in a personal campaign to gain release.

Stephen Mallory petitioned President Andrew Johnson directly and enlisted the support of some of his former colleagues in the Senate.

In June 1866, Mallory visited Washington, where he called on many of his old friends and political adversaries, including President Johnson and Secretary of War Edwin M Stanton, who received him cordially.

Stephen Mallory had long suffered occasional attacks of gout, and these continued to plague him in the postwar years.

Stephen Mallory is said to have been "listless" on November 8,1873, and that night he began to fail.

Stephen Mallory was buried in St Michael's Cemetery, Pensacola, Florida.